Tiger Woods' privacy

Tiger Woods was involved in a single-vehicle crash in his Cadillac Escalade early Friday near his Florida home. Sustaining only minor injuries, Woods will have a quick recovery.

The end, right?

Not exactly. The media is digging for an explanation and the police are investigating the incident with no real reason for believing a crime took place. Not helping his case, Tiger released only a vague news brief saying little about the accident. The report also noted that he will not appear at any more tournaments during 2009, but will return to competition in 2010. More can be found at CNN:

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/US/11/30/tiger.woods/index.html

Tiger is also refusing to speak to police or the media about the incident. As a major athlete and image for international brands, many are demanding answers. Woods, however, says "this is a private matter, and I want to keep it that way...the only person responsible for the accident is me."

There's no question that Tiger's PR people could have handled the situation in a more open and honest way. While Woods has the right to privacy, he is a famous figure who would benefit from being open with the public and sharing his mistakes. If it truly was just a car accident, his openness and cooperation would lead to the strengthening of his reputation rather than the potential harm this incident may cause.

Congratulations Macy's!

Macy's ran an advertisement in the Philadelphia Inquirer Monday congratulating the Phillies on winning the 2009 World Series. The ad exclaims, "Congratulations Phillies! Back-to-Back Champs."

The Phillies, however, have done no such thing. At least not yet.

The erroneous ad (pictured above) covers a good portion of an entire page and may cause anger among superstitious Phillies fans who see the ad as a curse. CBS news presents the story here:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/11/02/sportsline/main5500110.shtml

The most embarrassing part is that the "congratulations" ad was run not in some middle-of-nowhere, baseball-illiterate town, but in the hometown of the Phillies. The Inquirer quickly issued an apology after noticing the hefty mistake. To no surprise, widespread mention and ridicule of the error managed to travel throughout cyberspace before the Philadelphia paper sorted things out. It remains a mystery how such an advertisement was able to breach the gatekeepers of the Inquirer and reach the public.

In review, we can conclude that one thing is certain: either Macy's has begun an ingenious campaign for a new product that can predict with certainty the outcome of sporting events, or the accuracy of the media is only steepening in its decline.

Ignoring my fun side, I'll go with the latter.